“The war dragged on. It became even more miserable and even more desperate. In mid-August 1942, Malta was down to only a week or two of remaining food supplies. People were starving and subsisting on one small meal a day. Regular bombing raids had reduced much of the built-up area around the Harbour and beyond to rubble and the Nazis continued to torment the population with multiple daily air raids. It looked like they had no option but to capitulate and suffer a Nazi occupation, along with all the horrors they had heard about and learnt to associate with such a disaster. Surrender was imminent; perhaps two weeks away at most- “the absolute last issue from Island reserves occurs in five days, on 15 August (sic). After that we are down to the slaughter of horses and goats, once considered adequate for six months…the present census of animals on the Island is estimated to last from five to ten days.” Mr. Trench, manager of food distribution in Malta.[1]
Then, one hot August afternoon, the girls heard a loud disturbance outside in the street. People were shouting, laughing and singing. It was August 13th, two days before the feast of Santa Marija.[2] Pupa and Olympia went outside their building and out into the Ħamrun piazza to see what all the commotion was about. It seemed that everyone in the entire town was outside of their home and in the streets. People were crying and hugging one another as they rushed along the High Street towards the city of Valletta. The girls were swept along within the throng and moved down the street with the crowd. It was like a fantastic celebration the likes of which the girls had never seen. As they approached the stone bastions of Valletta, they saw a scene of mass hysteria with people standing on the ramparts cheering and waving. People were weeping with joy while waving flags.
The girls looked into the Grand Harbour to see three ships. They were the good ships Port Chalmers, Rochester Castle and Melbourne Star, three of the five surviving remnants of the convoy of food, medicines, ammunition and fuel codenamed, Operation Pedestal,[3] later renamed by the Maltese the Santa Marija Convoy, that had departed from Gibraltar on August 9th.
Several previously attempted convoys and their precious cargoes destined for the Malta lay on the bottom of the sea, intercepted by Axis fighter bombers and U-boats before they could reach the starving nation. In August 1942, the British decided to launch one last, desperate attempt to break the Axis blockade and land a convoy of supplies to save Malta, and henceforth, the North African campaign of General Montgomery and the Allies. The convoy was ambitious and at the same time, audacious. It consisted of 14 merchant ships including the fuel tanker, Ohio, escorted by 44 warships, including two battle ships and three aircraft carriers.
Apart from the three merchant ships that sailed into the Grand Harbour on the 13th, a fourth merchant ship, the Brisbane Star, sailed in late the next day . At 8am the day after that, the greatest prize of all, the tanker, Ohio, limped into harbour semi-submerged from bomb damage and propped up by a destroyer at each side and one at her bow. It was the 15th day of August and the Catholic fest day of the Assumption of Mary into Heaven, known to the Maltese as Festa Santa Marija.
The surviving vessels of the convoy had miraculously navigated through a tremendous onslaught from the Luftwaffe and the Italian Regia Aeronautica and had also endured multiple submarine attacks to travel from the Allied naval base at Gibraltar the 2,120 kilometres across the Mediterranean Sea all the way to the Grand Harbour, Malta. Some 53,000 tons of the original 85,000 tons of convoy supplies were on the seabed. The Ohio had 9,514 tons of fuel remaining from its original cargo of 13,000 tons.[4] Nine merchant ships, one aircraft carrier, two light cruisers and one destroyer were sunk and around 550 men killed.[5] The supplies that did get through lasted until the end of 1942 and allowed the successful harassment of Nazi supply lines from Italy to Rommel in North Africa to continue while also empowering the defence of the island. Malta had been saved from surrender and a Nazi occupation.
The successful arrival of 5 of the original 14 supply ships changed everything not only for Malta but also for the eventual success of the North African campaign as well as facilitating the future invasion of Sicily and hence, accelerating the end of the war. Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily, was directed from the Lascaris War Rooms, 46 metres under Valletta’s Upper Barrakka Gardens.[6]“
[1] naval-history.net. The Supply of Malta 1940-42, 1942, The Situation in Malta.
[2] Pronounced, “sahn-ta-maria”.
[6]“The Sicily Invasion Directed from Malta”, Times of Malta on-line article 9/6/23, bit.ly/43cgj0p
Stories My Parents Told Me 